Saturday, Apr 02, 2005
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HARARE, APRIL 1. With results starting to trickle in today, the Opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, accused the Government of trying to steal a parliamentary election and urged Zimbabweans to defend their vote. Mr. Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic change won 31 of the first 54 seats declared today, but said inconsistencies in the results were a sign of things to come and it now expected to lose seats overall in the 150-member Parliament. ``We do not accept that this represents the national sentiment ... The Government has fraudulently, once again, betrayed the people,'' Mr. Tsvangirai told reporters. ``We believe the people of Zimbabwe must defend their vote and their right to free and fair elections.'' Mr. Tsvangirai said his party would do more than merely appeal the result in Zimbabwe's courts — which the Government has packed with sympathetic judges. But he would not specify what action it would take. Previous attempts at protest have been violently crushed by security forces and members of the ruling party's youth militia, and the MDC has shied away from confrontation in recent years. The MDC won 57 of Parliament's 120 elected seats in the last legislative poll in 2000, despite what Western observers called widespread violence, intimidation and vote rigging. But it lost six seats in subsequent by-elections. The President, Robert Mugabe, appoints an additional 30 seats, virtually guaranteeing his Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front a majority. In 2002, Mr. Tsvangirai was narrowly declared loser of an equally flawed presidential poll.
Observers' concern
An elections observer mission from a key regional grouping raised concerns on Friday over the number of persons who were turned away from polling stations during voting in Zimbabwe. — AP
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